


Clay Pigeons

by Nottherealdean



Series: Dean!clones [1]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Blood, Gen, M/M, Self-cest, dean!clones, puppet!deans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-28
Updated: 2014-05-28
Packaged: 2018-01-26 21:15:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,114
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1702790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nottherealdean/pseuds/Nottherealdean
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The puppet!Deans Naomi made Cas kill don't stay dead.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Clay Pigeons

**Author's Note:**

> Posted on tumblr on Feb. 18, 2014.

After Naomi let Cas out of the training room, all the dead Deans came back to life. Their clothes and the skin beneath were reset to un-torn, factory standard, but the white floor beneath them was still smeared with rusty smudges and bloody puddles, neat drips and ragged handprints. That at least remained.

They were confused, all thousand-plus of them, and that many Deans stranded together in the big, empty space of the warehouse led to chaos. There was no cover or security in the glaring white room, just themselves. Of course, they were suspicious of one another. They tensed and circled each other warily, scrambled to get a back to a wall when on all sides were doppelgangers. Slowly though, one by one was reluctantly convinced of the truth when he was met with his clones’ equal mistrust (and sometimes when he watched himself die, messily, humanly, by his own hands). Some of them half-way wished the others were monsters, because it would be easier; some were a bit relieved that the persistent feeling of being a fake was finally borne out as truth. The violence, at any rate, trailed off to passive-agressive snark as they turned their focus outwards, to their blank white prison.

What felt like days passed for the Deans and the social aspect of all got stranger. A few minutes of nightmare hallucination and a handful of hours with a future self were hardly enough to prepare them for this extended experience of themselves. Everywhere around them were themselves, duplicated into enough bodies that the whole range of Dean was spread out on the warehouse floor simultaneously. All the anger, the fear, the helplessness, the determination, the despair, the hope, the humor, the bitterness; they bounced off each other and all the facets of Dean played out in different bodies started to make the Dean clones see each other as separate individuals as well as self. It was that that made them start to care. In the first hours after awakening they had worked at finding an exit together out of practicality, using their other selves as tools just as easily as they would use themselves. But the more they had to watch the emotion flash across another Dean’s face, the easier it was to start thinking of him as a person and the harder it was to believe that that emotion didn’t matter. The Deans started to empathize with each other. The urge to reach out and comfort, to ease the fear and pain, grew stronger, and they started wanting to save themselves. It helped that there were no mirrors in the white room.

Sometimes the comfort they— confusedly, begrudgingly, hesitatingly— offered their other selves was just asking how  _his_  training run had gone (Stabbed? Beaten? Choked? In the library with a candlestick, or in the conservatory with a rope? Colonel Mustard is a given. (If you joke about it, it can’t hurt you as bad)). Sometimes it was meeting his own eyes with an uncertain, almost shy half-smile, or looking away with an awkward  _you’re doing good_  when one looked about to crack. Sometimes it was actually talking and listening, and the knowledge that their most hated secrets were already shared. Sometimes things got more physical.

They found a way out eventually. Leaving a room full of over a thousand Deans unattended in Heaven was not a good long-term plan, but Naomi was gone and Metatron was the only angel in Heaven by then, and he didn’t even know about the Dean clones until they broke free. The army of Deans stayed together long enough to get the lay of the land, and take care of the most important things. First was killing the new dictator of Heaven, which really wasn’t that difficult. He wasn’t much of a fighter, and not nearly as clever as he seemed to think. Then came opening all the toll gates onto the Axis Mundi. That was a little harder, but Dean had done hard things before, and soon all the personal heavens had access roads out to a long stretch of blacktop.

Afterwards, the Deans splintered apart. Some left alone, but most went with company. Groups of Deans wandered Heaven, meeting up with souls they knew on Earth and seeing all the sights they never got to visit when they were alive (they argued over whether they were really the same person as the Earth Dean just duplicated and left in Heaven, or if they were cheap copies who had no claim to the real Dean’s life (the arguments often devolved into  _you think we’re real boys, Pinocchio?_  and  _great, I’m in love with someone who thinks we’re Cylons_ )).

They found the secret door to Purgatory (as it is below, so it is above, and if Hell has a portal, Heaven has a larger one). It felt more real than Heaven, this place that was built around one vast landscape for everyone and not isolated dreamlands. It felt honest, and open. Besides, Dean had been here before, and they knew it would be big enough for all of them. The Deans spread through Purgatory like a drop of ink in water. They ran wild on pure adrenaline and fight-or-flight instinct, settled into inexpertly- but enthusiastically-built cabins, roamed from hot spring to mountain top, lashed together log rafts and set out for the sea. They ran into each other, alone and in groups, and sometimes just gave a nod and moved on, sometimes stayed together for several days, sometimes for longer. They would talk all night about what they had done and seen, or wouldn’t say a word. They told stories about the monsters they had met, kinds they’d never heard of and souls they recognized. Benny was there. And Emma (in Purgatory there’s all the time in the world to hash things out, as long as you keep fighting for it). Some of the Deans’ stories were about killing, but a lot were about saving. Not all monsters are monstrous, but they all go to purgatory just the same. Someone ought to be there for the ones who couldn’t defend themselves. Someone should find the ones who wanted peace and safety, family and friends. And there were monster children, too. Not all had parents and siblings looking for them, but Dean was good at searching, and he liked kids.

A few of the Deans went through the portal to Hell. When the Deans had escaped the training room, Heaven had been littered with angel blades lying on burnt wing marks, and now those blades were carried into Hell. This time, salvation didn’t come for the Righteous Man, it came with him.


End file.
